As part of the ERC Project GRIP-ARM, I am organizing panels in two separate conferences.

The first panel is for the European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR), which would be the European equivalent of APSA in the US (https://ecpr.eu/GeneralConference). The panel will fit nicely in a section called “Energy and Society” (check here: https://ecpr.eu/StandingGroups/StandingGroupHome.aspx?ID=80). Deadline is February 10, 2022.

The second panel is for the Earth Systems Governance (ESG), which will be hosted in Toronto (https://www.earthsystemgovernance.org/2022toronto/). Deadline is January 25, 2022.

Panel Abstract

Incorporating Climate Justice in the Mining-Clean Energy Nexus: Towards a Pluralist Political Economy Agenda 

Chair: Jojo Nem Singh (nemsingh@iss.nl) 

The climate emergency demands a swift and radical transition towards clean energy. The COP26 agreement underlines the need for accelerated investments in renewable energy, requiring both industrialized and developing countries to live up to the principle of ‘common but differentiated responsibility’ in response to the climate crisis. As the recent IEA report suggests, demand for clean technologies to meet the Paris Agreement targets by 2040 will require an increase of more than 40 percent for copper and REEs, 60 to 70 percent for nickel and cobalt, and almost 90 percent for lithium. However, a social justice perspective is urgently required if we are to succeed in tackling climate change without creating new conflict / exacerbating inequalities. Climate justice perspectives can shine a light on a huge blind spot among global leaders and national policymakers—that the costs of the green transition are highly uneven, wherein significant amounts of raw materials for renewable energy and clean technology will need to be outsourced from a few developing countries. This panel seeks to discuss different political economy perspectives to unpack what a climate justice approach might look like in order to meaningfully explore how the clean energy transition can be achieved at a worldwide scale. This panel is the first of a series of activities between 2022 and 2025 to set out a research agenda to critically inform debates on energy transition, environmental politics, and development studies. We aim to bring various social science perspectives from an array of scholars based in both the global north and south to open and sustain a dialogue about climate justice and political economy as central frameworks in the energy transition.

If you are interested in any of the two events to present a paper, I’d be very pleased to welcome your paper. I have opened the call for other people to send their abstracts to me so please send the call to your network!

Check us at Twitter: @Jnemsingh or @GRIP_ARM